Yorkshire Almanac With political turmoil elsewhere, gunfire celebrating the ceremonial demarcation of Hull’s bounds is heard as “a strange and very wonderful thing”

12 October 1659: With political turmoil elsewhere, gunfire celebrating the ceremonial demarcation of Hull’s bounds is heard as “a strange and very wonderful thing”

J. Horsfall Turner, Ed. 1892. Strange Appearances. Yorkshire County Magazine, Vol. 2. Bingley: T. Harrison and Sons for the editor. Get it:

Unedited excerpt

If an excerpt is used in the book, it will be shorter, edited and, where applicable, translated.

STRANGE APPEARANCES.-The true relation of a strange and very wonderful thing that was heard in the air October 12th, 1659, by many hundreds of people:-As the Lord sees what a deep sleep is seized upon us as no low voice will awaken us, so He is pleased to roar aloud from heaven, intending thereby (in all likelihood) either to rouse us up out of our present security, or to leave us the more without excuse in the day of His fierce wrath. Now I come to relate the matter, the which was thus:-Upon the 12th day of October, in the afternoon, there was heard by some hundreds of people in Holderness Hedon, and about Hull, and several other places in Yorkshire-first, three great pieces of ordnance or cannons discharged in the air one after another, very terrible to hear, and afterwards immediately followed a peal of muskets. This shooting off of muskets continued about an half quarter of an hour, drums beating all the while in the manner just as if two armies had been engaged. Such as heard the aforesaid cannons, muskets, and drums, do report that the sound was from the north-east quarter, and to their thinking, not far from the place where they stood. Two men being together about six miles from Hull in Holderness, near Humber-side, supposed it was directly over Hull; whereupon one said to the other, “It being the sheriff’s riding-day at Hull, this peal of muskets must be there; and see (quoth he) how the smoke riseth!” Now the reason why he mentioned the smoke was, because no sooner was this noise finished over Hull, but (as it happeneth after the discharge of guns) there arose a very great smoke or thick mist round about the town, although immediately before (the day being a very clear day, and the sun shining all the while very bright) he saw the town very perfectly. One thing more was observed by him who saw the smoke over Hull; that all the while this prodigious noise continued (which was as he supposed, about the eighth part of an hour), the face of the sky (as in the eclipses of the sun) waxed very dim; yea, such a strange nature accompanied it, that the very earth seemed to tremble and quake under him. A certain gentleman, who had been some time a major in the war as he was riding with a friend between the towns of Patterington and Ottringham, was so persuaded that some encounter by soldiers was on the other side of a small hill where they were riding, as that they could not but mount the hill to try the truth, so plainly did the drums beat and the muskets go off, and, to their thinking, so near them, as either it must be a sign from Heaven or real battle hard by. The country people were struck with such strange wonder and deep terror, that they gave over their labour, and ran home with fear; yes, some poor people gathering coals by the sea side were so frightened that they ran away, leaving their sacks behind them. In conclusion: for the space of forty miles this fearful noise of cannons, muskets, and drums was heard all the country over.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

Comment

Hull to Patrington is about 15 miles for crows, but the sound of gunfire (though not perhaps musketfire) travelled greater distances at the time:

According to Derham, guns fired at Karlskrona were heard at Denmark, eighty or perhaps 120 miles distant. Dr. Hearn heard guns fired at Stockholm, 180 miles off. The cannonade of a sea-fight between the English and Dutch in 1672 was heard across England, at Shrewsbury and Wales, upwards of 200 miles from the scene of action. This last is a very remarkable circumstance, and it is to be remembered that in all to which allusion has been made, the sound travelled for the greatest part of the distance along the surface of water. The fact that sounds are more distinct and clear, and can be heard at a greater distance by night than by day, appears to be due, not only to the greater stillness then existing, and to the sense being engaged with one sound instead of many, but as Humboldt has said, to the greater homogeneity of the atmosphere, its density not then being affected by the partial variations in temperature (Pilcher 1843).

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Comment

Hull to Patrington is about 15 miles for crows, but the sound of gunfire (though not perhaps musketfire) travelled greater distances at the time:

According to Derham, guns fired at Karlskrona were heard at Denmark, eighty or perhaps 120 miles distant. Dr. Hearn heard guns fired at Stockholm, 180 miles off. The cannonade of a sea-fight between the English and Dutch in 1672 was heard across England, at Shrewsbury and Wales, upwards of 200 miles from the scene of action. This last is a very remarkable circumstance, and it is to be remembered that in all to which allusion has been made, the sound travelled for the greatest part of the distance along the surface of water. The fact that sounds are more distinct and clear, and can be heard at a greater distance by night than by day, appears to be due, not only to the greater stillness then existing, and to the sense being engaged with one sound instead of many, but as Humboldt has said, to the greater homogeneity of the atmosphere, its density not then being affected by the partial variations in temperature (Pilcher 1843).

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10 March 1665: Blizzards and Dutch attacks prolong Restoration-induced shortages of fodder and coal at Northowram (Halifax)

26 November 1851: Exports in sterling to foreign ports for the year to date by one of Hull’s largest shippers, Brownlow, Pearson and Co.

23 January 1640: Andrew Marvell’s father drowns in the Humber at Hull

5 July 1858: The view from the tower of Beverley Minster

26 April 1867: In a requiem to Hull’s whaling industry, the Diana sails into port at the end of its fateful Arctic voyage

3 January 1638: On the eve of the civil war, Henry Slingsby witnesses Royalist cavalry exercising near Wetherby on Bramham Moor, scene of the defeat of the Percy Rebellion in 1408

18 May 1734: The epitaph on the tombstone of the prolific William Strutton of Patrington, buried this day

18 February 1889: An effigy of Jack Nelson, wife-beater, is paraded with rough music through Hedon (Holderness) by a furious crowd

30 July 1820: Primitive Methodists try to disrupt the traditional Maudlin Fair football match between Hedon and Preston (Holderness)

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Comment

Although Mary Magdalene’s feast is conventionally 22 July, the Maudlin Fair was celebrated on and around 2 August on Magdalen Hill, Hedon. In 1820 the Sabbath preceding the fair was 30 July. John Nicholson, 70 years later, seems to suggest that it might not have been as unpleasant as the Methodist killjoys suggested:

As the Fair became of less importance, the tenant of the field tried to prevent anyone entering on the day appointed for the fair, and though sometimes unsuccessful, by dint of bribing and giving a shilling each to those desirous of entering, the fair was finally abolished about 1860. The following is a reprint of a song, descriptive of the fair in its best days:

Let lords in their bag wigs, and ladies in gauze,
At court strut and stare, or at balls seek applause,
Can such create envy, can aught give us care?
While pleasures invite us like Magdalen Fair.

No plotting ambition, no polished deceit,
No patches or paint, at this revel we meet;
Our greetings are blessings not purchased by wealth,
The smile of content, and the rose bloom of health.

Maidens long wishing for this happy day,
Pray old father time to pass quickly away;
To reach this gay scene, all contrivance they try,
And those who can’t get there – they sit down and cry.

Here damsels all beauty, enlivened by youth,
With eyes full of lightning and hearts full of truth;
Impelled by dame nature in spite of their dads,
Parade in their finest! and skyme [squint] at the lads.

And gallant young yeomen, our nation’s chief pride,
For such can be found in no country beside;
Each anxiously striving from notice apart,
To catch a kind look from the girl of his heart.

All sports and diversions for old and for young,
A medley of frolic is this jovial throng;
Shrill whistles and trumpets, bagpipes and gewgaw
Pots boiling, dogs fighting, and game of E.O. [badger-baiting].

Here’s wrestling and vaulting, and dancing on wire,
With fiddling, and juggling, and men eating fire,
Bold sergeants recruiting, lads ‘listing for life,
And family lessons from Punch and his wife.

Stalls hung with fine trinkets, before and behind,
Rich sweets for the palate, and books for the mind,
Famed singers of ballads, excelled by none,
And tellers of fortunes, who don’t know their own!

Huge giants, dwarf pygmies, wild beasts and wise ponies,
Rough bears taught to dance, with arch pug-macaronies!
Raree shows and safe horses, a penny a ride,
With grand entertainments, a thousand beside.

In words all the wonders would never be told,
The way to enjoy, is to come and behold;
The king’s coronation could nothing compare
To half the delights of the Magdalen Fair.

The badgers were obtained from the woods at Burton Constable, and were housed in barrels on the Fair ground. Sometimes there would be a dozen or more present at once. The man, who wished his dog to try conclusions with the badger, paid the owner of the badger sixpence; but the attempt to draw the badger not unfrequently ended in the death of the dog (Nicholson 1890).